Well right now nobody wants a lot of things because of better options. Limited unlocks highlights this a lot. In a world where you make the best out of the resources provided, this could be drastically different. With everything unlocked you should be picking gnome because you want the potions and if you get JJ that's a boon.

Let's say you have 5 potions and sacrifice 1. Expected yield for an individual potion rises from 40% max health to 50%, but your number of potions have dropped from 5 to 4. So on average this will be a wash; no net gain or loss. However, on the higher end of the potion yield you're much more likely to run into an over-heal condition, so your average case is actually worse. Furthermore, this does raise issues with the thief, priest, and bloodmage since their potion usage is somewhat different.

Overall, I think JJ's got enough random chance as it is. I'd be ticked off if his alter was just a big roulette wheel. That's already what his desecration effect is, and I don't like it at all.

Because of the current way the Trisword works, I'm actually not worried about Boost Health and Halflings. I think that one works quite nicely for what it is. Against most bosses, 15 HP is going to be 10-20% of their damage output, so the extra tanking potential is almost insignificant, and is only a big deal if it lets you survive a hit that would otherwise kill you. Anyone can benefit from that, and Halflings have the extra trade-off of losing +3 base attack that would otherwise be gained from their trisword.

Boost Mana works fundamentally differently, since mana effectively scales with level while HP does not, and mana thresholds are not nearly as influential as health thresholds. Not sure what the solution is, but given the dearth of options for spellcasters (basically just Jehora for non-fireballers currently) I wouldn't want to see this pulled until some other alternatives are added in.

What I don't like about it is that it's for BURNDAYRAZ specialists, and no one else. CYDSTEPP, HALPMEH, BYSSEPS, PISORF, and GETINDARE are all largely pointless if you've taken a considerable amount of weakening, so the only combat glyph that works well with mana leak is BURNDAYRAZ. This means you either take both flames and mana leak and eschew physical attacks altogether or you take neither.

This has largely undone the progress recently made with Mystera; she needs to appeal to a wider variety of characters, but four of her five boons are largely useless to physical specialists or hybrids. Her magic boon might be worthwhile if you combo it with some resistance bypass or reduction, but otherwise weakening is absurdly overpriced for anyone other than a magic damage specialist, flames and mana leak basically gimp your physical attack permanently, and refreshment isn't going to carry her on its own (not bad for a JJ convert, though).

Darvin wrote:What I don't like about it is that it's for BURNDAYRAZ specialists, and no one else. CYDSTEPP, HALPMEH, BYSSEPS, PISORF, and GETINDARE are all largely pointless if you've taken a considerable amount of weakening, so the only combat glyph that works well with mana leak is BURNDAYRAZ. This means you either take both flames and mana leak and eschew physical attacks altogether or you take neither.

This has largely undone the progress recently made with Mystera; she needs to appeal to a wider variety of characters, but four of her five boons are largely useless to physical specialists or hybrids. Her magic boon might be worthwhile if you combo it with some resistance bypass or reduction, but otherwise weakening is absurdly overpriced for anyone other than a magic damage specialist, flames and mana leak basically gimp your physical attack permanently, and refreshment isn't going to carry her on its own (not bad for a JJ convert, though).

JJ's Boost Health should be +3 or +4 bonus HP (i.e. with the level multiplier).

Or what if his boost effects had as a penalty a straight decrease in potion value? +4 MP, mana potions reduced in effectiveness by, say, 10 percent (i.e. they now restore only 30% max MP) or maybe something like a fixed reduction of -2 MP per potion (less hurt for Elves). Still a pretty good deal for Gnomes - but relatively speaking, other races will now get a lot more mileage out of the boon. A Gnome with 10 potions drops from 400% recovery (40% x 10) to 300%, a pretty big hit even with the MP boost, while anyone else drops from 160% (40% x 4) to 120%, a much smaller hit, relatively speaking.

I'm personally somewhat giddy at the idea of what a Wizard (or Assassin, since Swift Hands ignores all the damage penalties) could do with Mana Leak + Flames + Crystal Ball, just add BLUDTOPOWA and APHEELSIK, and either WEYTWUT or WONAFYT if you have to deal with Counter Fireball, and the only thing stopping you is magic immunity. But yeah, right now Mystera is just too niche; she's back where she was in the alpha, more or less.

Yeah, Assassin is how I beat Matron (easily I might add), although that was a JJ gnome. Namtar and Avatar would be viable, but counter fireball is going to hurt you. A lot. I haven't tried Naga City, but my guess is that you won't get enough mileage. Now Halls of Steel... I gotta try that.